Rushing Fall Delivers as Odds-On Favorite to Win JPMorgan Chase Jessamine

By Amy Owens —-

LEXINGTON, KY (Oct. 11, 2017) – E Five Racing Thoroughbreds’ Rushing Fall swept past the field with a devastating turn of foot to win the 27th running of the $150,000 JPMorgan Chase Jessamine (G3) for 2-year-old fillies by 3 1/4 lengths over Stainless before a Wednesday afternoon crowd of 9,475.

Trained by Chad Brown and ridden by Javier Castellano, Rushing Fall earned a berth in the
$1 million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf (G1) to be run Nov. 3 at Del Mar. It was the second victory in the race for Brown, who won in 2013 with Kitten Kaboodle.

Mentality led the field through opening fractions of :23.40 and :48.79 while Castellano had Rushing Fall near the back of the pack but racing in the clear.

Mentality was still in front when the field hit the top of the stretch, where Rushing Fall swung out widest of all and began picking off horses. She surged to the front inside the sixteenth pole and drew off with ease.

Rushing Fall, a Kentucky-bred daughter of More Than Ready out of the Forestry mare Autumnal covered the 1 1/16 miles on a turf course labeled as “soft” in 1:46.20.

The victory was worth $90,000 and increased Rushing Fall’s earnings to $135,000 with two victories in two starts.

Sent off as the 4-5 favorite in the field of 14, Rushing Fall returned $3.80, $2.80 and $2.40. Stainless, ridden by Manny Franco, returned $14.40 and $11 with Cash Out finishing a head back in third under Florent Geroux and paying $6 to show.

Layla Noor finished fourth and was followed in order by Sugar Queen, Sunny Skies, Mentality, Rosie O’Prado, Punto de Entrada, She’s All Skeet, Breaking Beauty, Madame X., Lady O’Toole and Miss Mo Mentum.

Racing continues Thursday with a 10-race program that begins at 1:05 p.m. ET. Keeneland will offer a Pick Six carryover of $3,955 and a Super High Five carryover of $5,660.

Quotes from the $150,000 JPMorgan Chase Jessamine (G3)

Chad Brown (winning trainer of Rushing Fall via text)

“Extremely impressive, but I’m not surprised. She identified herself as special the first time we breezed her on the turf for us. We are lucky to have her.”

Javier Castellano (winning rider)

On whether he knew Rushing Fall was capable of such a come-from-behind run

“Absolutely. The way she ran the first time, that’s the impression she gave me. She doesn’t have much speed in the beginning of the race. I let her fall out of there and see how the race developed. There was a little more speed in the race, and I wanted her to feel comfortable. Turning for home, I just asked her a little bit and she gave me another gear.

“The way she did it today, very amazing. Big field, very competitive horses. The way she did it with the soft ground, come from way back, had to go around a couple of horses – I went a little wide – all those situations. She really came through.”

Manny Franco (rider of runner-up Stainless)

“She broke a little bit slow. I didn’t want to rush her after that, and I followed the winner all the way around. She was second best today. She liked the turf; she handled it better than dirt.”

Laurie Wolf of Star Ladies Racing (owner of Stainless)

“She ran really well. It will be up to (trainer Todd Pletcher) on where she will run next. She did well and did much better coming out of the gate than her last race (when she stumbled at the start). Todd liked the way she worked on the turf and thought she would like it better.”

Florent Geroux (rider of third-place finisher Cash Out)

“I wish I could have tucked in a little bit more, but other than that I thought she ran great. She showed a lot of fight. She broke sharply, I took my time with her and she put me in the race. I was close to where I wanted to be, but I wish I could have been closer to the pace than where I was.”

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For more than 80 years, the Keeneland Association has devoted itself to the health and vibrancy of the Thoroughbred industry. As the world’s largest Thoroughbred auction company, Keeneland conducts sales every January, September and November. Its sales graduates dominate racing across the globe at every level. In April and October, Keeneland offers some of the highest caliber and richest Thoroughbred racing in the world. In 2015, Keeneland hosted the Breeders’ Cup World Championships. Uniquely structured, Keeneland is a private, for-profit corporation that returns its earnings to the industry and the community in the form of higher purses, and it has donated millions of dollars in charitable contributions for education, research and health and human services throughout Central Kentucky. To learn more about Keeneland, visit Keeneland.com.